


These Old Bones

by AnxietyAvocado



Category: Fruits Basket, Fruits Basket (Anime 2019), Fruits Basket - Takaya Natsuki (Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Archaeology, F/F, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Slow Burn, i honestly don't know what else to tag other than there are shenanigans
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:33:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25345507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnxietyAvocado/pseuds/AnxietyAvocado
Summary: Eccentric and richer than God himself, Akito Sohma had a habit of funding some of the wildest, strangest, and downright dangerous digs. Kyo had taken part in several of them, his last one three years ago, and he had sworn off working for the woman and her irritatingly odd husband Shigure after he nearly lost his hand in Iran. Since then he had been holed up in an office working on publishing research. But when his grant money ran out, Kyo needed another job, so here he was.On a helicopter. In Greece. Over the mountains. On his way to a ridiculously remote area. And with Kureno in the pilot’s seat, he wasn’t sure they would ever make it there in one piece.
Relationships: Hanajima Saki/Uotani Arisa, Honda Tohru/Sohma Kyou, Manabe Kakeru/Sohma Yuki, Sohma Akito/Sohma Shigure, Sohma Hatsuharu/Sohma Rin
Comments: 7
Kudos: 20





	1. Chapter 1

Eyes closed, Kyo leaned back against his seat in the helicopter, trying to focus on anything but the fact that they were currently god-only-knew how many miles into the middle of nowhere in Greece, and that  _ Kureno  _ was in the pilot’s seat. Every single time he agreed to go on a dig funded by Akito, he said it was the last time, but here he was again.  _ God _ , he was such a sucker - but he was a sucker who was going to get paid very well at least. 

Eccentric and richer than God himself, Akito Sohma had a habit of funding some of the wildest, strangest, and downright dangerous digs. Kyo had taken part in several of them, his last one three years ago, and he had sworn off working for the woman and her irritatingly odd husband Shigure after he nearly lost his hand in Iran. Since then he had been holed up in an office working on publishing research. But when his grant money ran out, Kyo needed another job, so here he was. 

On a helicopter. In Greece. Over the mountains. On his way to a ridiculously remote area. And with Kureno in the pilot’s seat, he wasn’t sure they would ever make it there in one piece. 

“Do you have to fly so low over these mountains?” he yelped, the seatbelt bunched in his fists. 

Shigure, across from him, chuckled. “Don’t be such a scaredy cat, Kyo. Yuki here isn’t complaining.”

Kyo felt compelled to point out that Yuki was asleep, and therefore incapable of complaining and also in the only state that Kyo could tolerate him, but saying it out loud would probably jinx the whole damn thing, so he kept his mouth shut and focused on looking out the window to see where they were headed. 

* * *

Surprisingly, they all survived the helicopter ride, and Kyo stumbled out and was ready to kiss the ground in gratitude.  _ The next time I agree to take a job for Akito I’m arranging my own transportation, cost be damned _ , he thought. 

They had landed on a rocky outcropping, and the dig site stretched out behind them towards scrubby brush that was broken up by orange cones and generators attached to large standing lights. Dropping his bag, Kyo looked around and stretched, arms reaching over his head. It actually wasn’t half bad - he had certainly been dropped in worse places before for work. The ocean stretched out below him, crashing into the rocks , and it looked like there was even a sandy beach nearby as well. It made sense that there would be old settlements here - the place was nearly perfect. 

From behind him, a voice called out his name. “Hey, Kyo! Over here! We’ve set up camp this direction. You hungry?”

“Momiji, nice to see you, kiddo.” Out of everyone he had encountered so far, Kyo was at least happy to see Momiji. Even if he wasn’t exactly sure what the blonde did on these jobs, he was a great guy to work with. 

“You have to stop calling me kiddo! I’m only a year younger than you,” Momiji answered with a laugh. “Keep that up and I won’t let you set up your tent next to mine. The only space left will be between Kureno and Shigure, and you know what that’s like…”

He did know what that was like. There was one trip to Peru where he got there late and ended up between the two men. Everything was fine until Akito decided to fly down to “supervise”, which resulted in an argument between her and Shigure, a knock down, drag out fight between Shigure and Kureno, and no end of rumors around the camp about exactly what had caused it. No one had slept much that night between Akito screaming at Kureno and Shigure drunkenly trashing his tent, least of all Kyo, so he was happy to be placed as far away from them as possible on this trip. 

The camp itself was set up in an orderly fashion. There were a few rows of tents, a large work area with tables and tool cabinets and other machinery under a large pavilion-like covering, portable showers not far off (now he remembered why he worked for Akito when offered - they supplied amenities like nobody’s business) and a makeshift mess hall where Momiji was currently leading Kyo to. A handful of people occupied a table and looked like they were playing a card game. 

As they approached, a dark haired man about Momiji’s age looked up and waved in greeting. “There you are. We’re about to start the next game if you want in.” His voice was even and quiet, and strangely empty of inflection. 

Momiji shook his head in answer. “I’ll play a little later. Megumi, introduce everyone, will you? This is Kyo Sohma. It’s been a few years since he’s been out in the field. I’m going to go claim a tent for him while Shigure is busy.” Without a farewell, he grabbed Kyo’s bag and walked off. 

The dark haired boy - Megumi, Kyo assumed - looked at him with eyes nearly the same shade as his hair. Scooting over on the bench, he made room for Kyo before he began introductions. 

“I’m Megumi Hanajima, and this” he nodded to the girl to his left, “is my sister Saki. We’re your resident occult and religious experts.” Continuing around the circle, he started with the girl on Saki’s other side. “Arisa Uotani, general badass, Hatsuharu Sohma and Rin Sohma, our movers and shakers, and Tohru Honda, our dynamics expert. We have-”

Whatever Megumi was saying about whatever they had fell off into static background noise as Kyo, who had been nodding silent greetings to each member of the group as they were introduced, made eye contact - and then quickly and embarrassedly - looked away from Tohru Honda. While most everyone seemed at least a little dusty and more than a little hungover or too under-caffeinated, she looked refreshingly… Alive. Bright. Happy. Something that Kyo couldn’t quite place, only that she stood out from the rest of them and he was uncomfortably aware of the group’s eyes on him when he sat there staring at the table, stealing glances at her as she sat there, apparently in her own little world. 

“-them later. You’ll watch out for her if you know what’s good for you.” _ What?  _ Kyo had no idea what Megumi was going on about, but nodded mutely anyway. 

Luckily, Kyo was saved from responding by Momiji, who had returned with Shigure in tow, both of them looking for Kyo to give him a run down of the camp, where everything was, and what they were looking for. Even though it meant spending time with one of his… less appealing co-workers, Kyo took the excuse and got up from the table to follow him. 

Behind him, Arisa shook her head in disbelief. “Dead man walking, ladies and gentlemen,” she said with a soft chuckle. “I give it a week.”

“Three days,” Saki countered. “You know she won’t wait that long.”


	2. Chapter 2

It wasn’t three days. It wasn’t three  _ hours _ before she made her move. 

Kyo had settled into his tent - spacious, room for a camping cot, his bag, a small table and a chair - and was pulling out a stack of books when a bell rang in the distance. Even though it had been a few years, even he knew that it was a bell for food (dinner? It was probably dinner.  _ Fuck _ jetlag.) and he made his way back to where he had been introduced to the group from earlier. 

Luckily, he had a decent walk to clear his head and gather his thoughts, since his tent was across from Haru and Rin’s and next to Momiji, second from the end of the row. He was away from the overeager crowd, and closer to the showers - those looking to impress usually set up near the front of the camp with those who wanted to be first to the meals, but that was where Shigure (and Akito, should she choose to grace them with her presence) usually were, so the further away from them the better in Kyo’s mind. 

The first meal with the whole camp was always interesting - he would be looked at like some odd specimen under a microscope, asked all kinds of questions ranging from the vague to the unprofessionally personal, and generally not be left in peace until someone or something else new showed up at camp. That was fine, expected even, but that didn’t mean that he had to like it. With both Shigure and Kureno in attendance, though, things were terse and the group was rather reserved. That suited Kyo just fine, and he managed to grab his plate and sit down without too much incident. 

“So where’s Yuki?” he asked around a mouthful of food. The question wasn’t directed at anyone in particular, as he wasn’t really willing to directly disrupt any conversations yet. 

The dark-haired woman - Saki, he recalled - answered. “Overseeing the other dig site. He’ll probably crash there tonight if they don’t come back for dinner.”

_ Other dig site? _ “Oh right.” Kyo nodded along, but didn’t respond. Clearly he had missed something earlier. He resumed eating without any following questions, and Saki turned back to her conversation with Tohru, looking far more animated than he had seen her thus far. 

Everyone, it seemed, had a small group of friends if not at least one person to spend time with, and Kyo felt put out for the moment. Out of everyone present, he knew Momiji the best, followed by Rin and Haru, but the rest of the crew was new to him (he refused to count Shigure or Yuki in this). To add to the disproportionate social groups, several more people approached. There was Yuki, who was walking closely with a tall dark-haired man and a woman who looked as though she’d rather be anywhere else in the world, trailed by a shorter man and a woman who was wearing an alarming shade of pink both on her shirt and the bandana in her hair. 

That was how Kyo settled on sitting on the fringes of the groups, quietly sneaking glances at Tohru that he frequently told himself were not him being creepy, just observational. So it went on - eat, sneak a glance, be very interested in food, move said food around on plate, listen to conversations around him, sneak another glance, eat, another glance, glance while drinking from his bottle of water, push food around some more… Whatever kept him there long enough to try and understand just who this woman was who didn’t really fit in, but still meshed so well with everyone. 

He was so engrossed in this process that he didn’t notice the woman in pink standing across the table from him until she had cleared her throat - and from the look on her face, might have done so more than once. 

As soon as he made eye contact, she grinned and asked, “Is this seat taken?”

Saved from actually answering by the fact that he had a mouthful of rice and chicken - and forgetting his bad manners from earlier, Kyo gestured at the seat in a  _ Be my guest _ sort of motion. 

“I’m Kimi Toudou, cultural and legal counsel,” she offered brightly. “And you must be none other than Kyo Sohma. The brilliant, hot-headed, reclusive archaeologist who hasn’t been heard from for  _ years _ .”

That was… disconcerting. “Looks like I don’t need to introduce myself then,” he said distractedly, still continuing his pattern of eating and sneaking glances at Tohru. 

She looked at him thoughtfully. “So, like,” she started, “if you’re a Sohma, does that mean you’re related to everyone else here?”

And… there it was. God, he hated that question. 

“We’re… cousins,” he said slowly. Technically, yes, he was pretty sure that he was related to the rest of the Sohmas, but the thought that he could actually be related to Shigure and Yuki? That wasn’t something he was prepared to acknowledge, and actually, Sohma wasn’t that uncommon of a last name, so it was just as likely that he wasn’t related to them at all. It was much better to keep it vague, and then just claim the Sohmas that he actually liked the thought of being related to, like Hatsuharu, Rin, and Momiji. 

“That’s  _ fascinating _ ,” Kimi said, placing her chin in the palm of her hand, elbow resting on the table. “I wonder where they’ve been hiding you. It seems so unfair that I haven’t had the  _ pleasure _ yet.”

Something about her tone made the hairs on the back of Kyo’s neck raise and stand on end, and he got the feeling that she didn’t just mean work when she said that. His expression darkened and he looked pointedly at his plate instead of answering her. The sudden awkward silence must have been noticeable even to those around them, because the next time Kyo tried to sneak a glance, Tohru was looking at him with concern written plainly across her face. This was the kind of conversation, the kind of moment, that he hated. He was sure that Kimi meant well, but he didn’t like getting questions about his life or where he had been, or why he had left field work for research and writing instead. More than that, he hated the pity from people who knew what the real story was - and apparently Tohru was one of those people. Who told her? It was probably Momiji, they looked very buddy-buddy. Damn that bubbly kid...

Standing up abruptly, he muttered something about needing to get some rest and left the mess hall, dropping his plate and utensils in the buckets provided before going back to his tent and closing himself inside, collapsing onto his cot with a frustrated huff. 

Megumi passed Momiji a paper bill under the table, rolling his eyes. 

* * *

Sunrise came far too soon for Kyo’s liking. Pulling himself out of bed, still wearing his clothes from the day before, he made his way toward the dig site, not in the mood for breakfast after last night’s encounter with Kimi. 

Most everyone else seemed to still be eating, or at least just not working, because the only person he saw working was Momiji. The blond was laying out grids using twine and ground stakes, apparently having moved on to a new plot of land from several days before. 

Silently, Kyo claimed a grid for himself and got to work. There was a quiet, calming rhythm to it all, and he quickly lost himself to the pattern and repetition of his actions. In what seemed like minutes, hours had gone by, and - mercifully - no one had spoken to him yet. Socializing couldn’t be avoided forever, though, because with a few trays full of  _ stuff  _ \- it wasn’t a weapon so it wasn’t his gig - he needed to head back to the work center to hand off the goods. 

The walk was silent - everyone else was in their element as well, these early stages so crucial to the whole operation - and he passed Haru, Rin, and Arisa without comment. 

Under the shade of the pavilion sized tent, the Hanajima siblings were digging through stacks of books, piles of notes and photographs within reach, while Momiji was enthusiastically discussing something (Kyo wasn’t curious enough to get closer and eavesdrop) with Shigure, and Tohru was bent over a tray of artifacts, duster brush in one hand and magnifying glass in the other. The look of pity on her face the night before flashed before his eyes, but he soldiered on anyway, jaw clenched and shoulders nearly the same height as his ears. 

“Kyo!” she greeted enthusiastically - was she always this peppy? Kyo thought that must be exhausting. “Do you have something for me to look at? I’d be happy to, as soon as I’m done with this tray here. You can wait if you want.”

Setting down his trays just out of her reach, he slid onto a tall stool nearby and stretched his neck, cracking it lightly. “Uh, yeah. Sounds great. What are you working on?”

Tohru, if possible, beamed even brighter at the question. “It’s fascinating! Earlier, Rin unearthed some pottery shards and if you look very closely, you can see some faint images of what was painted on there! We would have to send them off for better analysis if we wanted a clear picture, of course, but since I’m the cultural expert so to speak, they want me to look at it first to see if it’s anything worthwhile!”

Kyo stared at her dumbly, trying to take in all of the words being thrown at him after hours of silence only punctuated by the scrape of his trowel. “Cultural expert? Isn’t that… the pink one’s job?”  _ Great, go right ahead and forget names, dumbass. That makes you look  _ really  _ professional.  _

When she laughed, it was joyful, almost music-like in it’s quality, at least to him. “Kimi? Oh gosh no! When she says she deals with culture she means live people, like what’s going on in the world right now. I deal with ancient cultures. Stuff like family dynamics, social structures, that kind of thing! I work with the Hanajimas really closely, since they study religions. Between us and Momiji, who knows politics like nobody’s business, we tend to cover most of the relevance of what you all find.”

Not for the first time, Kyo felt inadequate. Sure, his field of study wasn’t exactly obscure, but he had never had this much  _ passion  _ for what he worked on. It was interesting in a clinical way, studying things from afar like this. Tohru acted almost as if she was talking about something that happened last week. 

“So what do you study?”

The question shook him out of his reverie. “Oh, um,” he stopped short. “Military?”  _ Why is that a question? It’s not like you don’t know what you’ve been working on.  _ “Military stuff. I mean history. Armor, weapons, things like that.”

She looked at him as if she was expecting more explanation, but Kyo wasn’t sure how much to share. How much did she know about his career anyway? He gaped at her before he realized his mouth was opening and closing silently, which probably looked fish-like enough to be concerning. 

“Sohowlonghaveyouworkedwiththecrew?” The words tumbled breathlessly out of him, and he took a deep breath to try again. “So, how long-”

Tohru cut him off with a smile. “Just a little more than a year. I started college pretty late and found Megumi in my graduate program. I had already known Saki from high school, but he’s the one who got me into all this. We ended up on a dig in Brazil together with Yuki, and he recommended us! The four of us have been working with the team ever since Saki and Arisa got married. You took a break from field work right?”

_ Fuck _ . Not that again. That was something Kyo wasn’t ready to talk about, not even with a stranger like her, no matter how bright and bubbly and cute she was.  _ Wait, cute? Nope. No. Don’t go there. You are here for work and to stick it to Akito that she didn’t break you. Shut up shutupshutup.  _

Swallowing hard, he looked for an escape. “I think I’m going to go grab a bottle of water or something. I gotta go.”

Visibly baffled, Tohru watched him walk away, calling after him about the trays that he had left for her, and didn’t he want to see if they were anything important? Her words met open air, though, because he was out of the pavilion and well on his way to the mess hall, out of earshot. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bless anna (floraltohru) for her listening to my rambling and contributing ideas to this meandering nonsense. I promise you some fanservice in a bit, girl. It'll be worth it. 
> 
> Comments/kudos/shares are love ya'll. I'm akitoes on tumblr if you wanna yell at me about this.


	3. Chapter 3

A week and a half later, they were all dead on their feet. For days, they worked through a heatwave so oppressive and heavy that Kyo didn’t even feel like reading after dinner, instead taking a cold shower for as long as he could stand before falling asleep on top of his cot, blankets and all. As each day progressed, another person on the site looked like Kyo felt - worn, exhausted, and in a constant state of just warm enough to be uncomfortable with no relief in sight. 

The problem, however, wasn’t truly noticeable until even Momiji and Tohru started to wilt under the heat and the workload. It wasn’t unusual for Kyo, Haru, or Rin to look tired or grumpy (especially if one of them didn't get enough coffee that morning), but when their resident “rays of sunshine” looked upset and overworked, even Shigure knew it was time for a break. And when Kimi announced, with far too much cheer, that the local village had a bar and she had a portable karaoke machine… Well, no one turned her down. Hell, no one even questioned why she had brought the karaoke machine with her in the first place. 

Shigure had sent them all on their way with a merry wave, promising lots of coffee and hungover breakfast foods in the morning (“From who?” Yuki had asked, acid in his tone. “The Ritz? You don’t even know how to cook.”) and they had all piled into the back of a van driven by Machi - whom Kyo was introduced to in a rush on their way there - and went in search of alcohol and good times that they might not remember the next day. 

Once they arrived at the bar - which felt a lot more like a dive, if dives had bright blue and green tiles and a weird stage in a corner - Kimi ordered a round of drinks for everyone in fluent Greek that had more than a few people looking at her strangely. 

She gave them a look that said _What, like it’s hard?_ when she answered, “Cultural counsel… _duh_.” 

Seeing as this surprised no one else, Kyo shrugged and accepted the drink with thanks, and settled in to watch the shitshow that he was sure was brewing. The bar was empty other than his associates (friends?) and the bartender, so there was no one to argue when Tohru and Momiji set up the karaoke machine and loudly - and in Tohru’s case, horribly - sang along to “Dancing Queen” and “Mamma Mia”. As Kyo sat there nursing his drink, he had to admit that the pair of them were disgustingly adorable, all flushed cheeks and bright eyes, and laughing, breathless singing which was horribly out of tune. There was a pang of something in Kyo’s chest, a tight, uncomfortable feeling that made him irrationally irritated towards Momiji for a moment, but he pushed it away. It was probably just the kid’s bad singing, he rationalized. 

“Hey Momiji,” he called out, “You might wanna stick to violin, kiddo!”

In return, Momiji stuck his tongue out at Kyo before flouncing off to sit with Megumi and two of the other new additions, Nao and Kakeru. Now _there_ was a mismatched pair if he had ever seen one. Momiji called them the definition of the “tol and smol” meme, whatever that meant - Kyo wasn’t about to ask anyone involved, especially since Nao appeared to have a short fuse. Kakeru seems easy going enough, if not a bit loud, but he hadn’t asked Kyo any overly personal questions yet, so he was prepared to tolerate him a bit longer. 

Kyo was pulled out of his reverie by Haru, who had pulled up a chair and clapped a hand on Kyo’s shoulder and leaned in. 

"Let's play Never Have I Ever," he said, almost as if commenting on the weather. _Yes, because it's no big deal to play that with you,_ Kyo thought ungraciously, _You shifty freaky weirdo._ "We all get five, and rules are if you get called out, finger goes down, and you take a shot. Got it? I'll start

Never have I ever slept with a coworker." The grin he gave was almost inhuman. This was why Kyo didn't play games like this with Haru - the quiet, unassuming man was dangerous to play with. 

Immediately, he and Rin, as well as Arisa, Saki, Kimi, Kakeru, and Yuki all put a finger down. With a deep sigh, Kyo did too, and waited for the questions. Of course, Megumi, Machi, Tohru, and Momiji still had all five to go after the first round, and Tohru was staring at what Kyo assumed was a fascinating floor tile while Momiji’s face turned a vibrant shade of pink. 

“Now, most of you make sense, but Kyo and Yun-Yun?” Kakeru cackled. “Don’t tell me it was each other.”

Kyo grimaced, and his one word answer was all the explanation the rest of the Sohmas needed. “Kagura.”

Yuki, that smug asshole, just smiled and kept his mouth shut. 

Kimi went next - giving her challenge before anyone made Yuki answer for the last one, saying something about accidentally asking for a bottle of vodka instead of directions to the bathroom while downing a double shot (because she could? Kyo just couldn’t get a read on this woman), which caused Yuki to point out that the objective was to out _other_ people, not herself. When it was Kakeru’s turn, he named having an unrequited crush on a coworker and - why was he looking at Yuki so pointedly while filling up his shot glass? And why were Momiji, Yuki, and Haru taking shots?

“Haru, put that finger back up. Unless you need to tell me something?” Rin asked. 

“I had a crush on you for ages before you noticed me,” he said plainly. 

Rin sighed, with the clear expression of someone who dealt with Haru’s brand of ridiculous a _lot._ “Oh my god, babe, we’re _married_.” 

“So?

Anyway, Kyo, your turn.”

“Never have I ever… licked an artifact?” 

Everyone except for the Hanajima siblings put a finger down and took a shot, which caused an immediate uproar at their table. It made sense for people like Kakeru, Kyo, Momiji, Arisa, Haru, and Rin to have done so - it was an acceptable method of testing to see if something was bone or pottery. But Tohru, Machi, Yuki, and Kimi? That was just weird. 

“I demand answers!” Kakeru shouted. “Sister mine, when on _Earth_ would you have done something like this?”

Machi looked at him with a glare that would have turned a less self-confident man to a pile of goo. “Don’t call me that ever again, and on a dare in college.” 

She turned to Tohru with a noticeably friendlier expression. “What about you, Tohru?”

“A week ago,” she said, still grimacing from the burn of the alcohol. “I couldn’t figure out if something was part of a tile I had found or just a bone piece. It was bone. It’s not like it’s weird or anything! People in our jobs do that all the time right? Or was Shigure just messing with me again?”

Several people chimed in to reassure her that it was a real thing, and that Shigure hadn't been been joking with her, but during that exchange Kyo looked at Yuki and was sure that the dark look on the man's face was mirrored on his own. As much as he wanted to hope otherwise, Kyo was sure that Shigure hadn’t left his “messing with” Tohru at words only, and the thought made his stomach swoop painfully. That pervert never could figure out how to keep his hands or his words to himself, and there was a standing agreement among him, Haru, and Yuki from years back (before Yuki pushed his buttons as much as he did now) that if any of them actually witnessed Shigure doing something inappropriate, they would cut his hands off and feed them to carnivorous… somethings. While Shigure watched. As vague half-drunk plans went, it actually wasn’t half bad. 

After eight more rounds, the game was down to Tohru, Megumi, and Machi. Tohru was left with two fingers, Megumi one, and Machi one as well. College had apparently been a _very_ interesting time, and Kyo downed a few shots on his own, hoping the alcohol would wipe his brain clean from the things he had learned in the last few rounds alone. 

Arisa was standing behind Tohru, massaging her shoulders in a move that looked vaguely like a boxer and their coach from those old movies Kyo had watched as a child. 

“You got this girl,” she said fiercely. “One good question and you can knock them both out. So… think the opposite of how you normally would. Because I love you, but you’re like if a cloud of cotton candy and a unicorn had a baby.”

With an expression so serious that it was comical, Tohru considered her opponents carefully. Kakeru was standing behind Machi, who was sitting across from Tohru, and began to mime something wildly, waving his hands around and bobbing his head like a chicken while making what Kyo thought looked like a dying fish face. Tohru was confused as well, eyes flickering between him and Machi. 

“Well, I know I can get Megumi, so he can wait but-” she trailed off as she tried to watch Kakeru again. “Machi… never have I ever… bobbed for apples?” her voice cracked at the end, the question ending weakly. 

There was silence. 

For a moment, the air seemed loaded with possibility, but then no one moved. Not a single finger went down. 

Kakeru howled. “Bobbing for apples? How did you get bobbing for apples when I clearly was miming a _blow job?_ Tohru, sweetie, I love you, but what the hell?”

The room exploded into laughter as Tohru turned bright red. Kakeru tried to walk her through his failed miming one step at a time, but before he got too far Yuki wrapped an arm around his shoulders and forced him to go to the bar so they could both get the next round of drinks before he could say anything else inappropriate. 

Kyo stood up with a stretch, making the excuse that he needed to get some air, but really he was avoiding whatever drunken party game Haru might come up with next. 

Outside, it was at least cooler, and much quieter. Kyo wandered aimlessly up and down the street to stretch his legs after sitting for so long, eventually wandering his way back to the bar and leaned against the side of the building, just around the corner from the entrance. 

There were certain aspects of field work that he had been prepared for when he accepted the job offer. Weeks away from home, portable showers (if you were lucky), campfire food that got repetitive after the first week or so, and the knowledge that you would be shaking dust out of anything you brought with you for weeks after were just things that you dealt with. Those were things that Kyo was okay with. But bars? Karaoke? Drunk party games with people who knew too much about him, and surrounded by people who he didn’t know and wasn’t comfortable with? Just the thought made him shift his shoulders against the wall and close his eyes against the uncomfortable feeling that it left him with. 

He stayed like that for several minutes, quietly breathing in the rapidly cooling air, unwilling to move even though the stucco of the building was beginning to dig into his shoulder blades.

That was a mistake. 

Several things happened all at once. Small, warm hands snuck up the hem of his shirt, fingers hooked in the waistband of his jeans. At the same time, a warm body pressed up against him, pushing him flush against the wall. A mouth attached to his in a kiss, sucking on his bottom lip, nipping at it lightly followed by a tongue sweeping along the same path. 

Kyo, still buzzed and newly confused, didn’t immediately push whoever it was away. Instead, his hands moved, first to their waist and then to the masses of soft hair at the nape of their neck, pulling them closer as he swallowed their moan. For several blissful moments, his mind was completely blank as they kissed, growing bolder and more exploratory with hands and mouths, Kyo eventually wrapping an arm around their waist to move them, flipping positions so he was pressing them against the wall, and all his brain could process was that this felt _good_ and as he took a breath in to whisper their name (so helpfully supplied by his imagination)-

There was a cough that sounded almost like a squeak from just a few feet away. Kyo opened his eyes and saw that he wasn’t kissing who he thought, who he had hoped, and the realization that he had Kimi Toudou pressed up against a wall, their chests heaving as they gasped for air, was like a bucket of cold water being dumped on him. 

Especially when he realized that it was Tohru who had coughed, and was now looking anywhere but at the two of them, her cheeks visibly pink in the low light. 

“Um, you guys?” she asked, eyes on a stack of nearby boxes, “Machi is ready to drive us all back, so, um… yeah. We’ll be in the van. Bye!”

She scampered off before Kyo could say anything - but what would he say? He felt as though he needed to apologize, not like he actually had a reason to, but the knowledge that he had just done what he had done dragged his stomach toward his feet. 

Kimi, for her part, pressed a kiss to Kyo’s cheek and straightened out her clothes, slipping sideways out of their embrace to head for where the van s parked. 

Drawing in a ragged breath and running a hand through his hair, Kyo stood there a moment longer, dumbfounded, before he slowly started walking after her. What the _hell_ had just happened?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always, thank you floraltohru for continuing to put up with my bullshit. i hope paying you in fanservice is working out.  
> don't worry, kimi isn't just some multilingual chick who goes around kissing people - there's a lot more to her and you'll find out soon enough! 
> 
> how many references to other shows or movies did you find in this chapter?
> 
> i'm akitoes on tumblr, and i will always appreciate asks/comments/shares/kudos and the like.


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